


raise you like a phoenix

by MaryPSue



Series: firebird suite [1]
Category: X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Past Character Death, Temporary Character Death, and then killing her off again, because I am old and have not caught up with the McAvoy ones, heavily inspired by the first three movies, it's semi-meta about how they keep bringing Jean back for adaptations, look idk what to tell you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-22
Updated: 2016-06-22
Packaged: 2018-07-16 17:23:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7277098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaryPSue/pseuds/MaryPSue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coming back to life is the easy part.</p>
            </blockquote>





	raise you like a phoenix

When you wake, it is in ashes.

…

These are the things that you left behind:

1\. Several red pens, all uncapped, the caps chewed.

2\. A wardrobe full of dark blue jeans, solid-coloured blouses, denim and leather jackets. There are skirts and frocks hanging at the back of the closet that look like something your grandmother might have worn at your age. Whatever age that is.

3\. A cell phone with several contacts. You can put faces, the kind, hopeful ones that met you when you woke, to all of the names. There are no entries in the ‘Family’ category.

4\. Several burned CDs, all labeled in a large, round, girlish hand. They all have titles like 'Road Trip Mix’ and 'Pumped Up Workout Mix’. None of them, when you try to put them in the stereo, will play.

5\. A pewter photo frame, hinged in the middle with a frame on either side. A woman looks out of the sepia photograph on the left, a man from the right. They wear stiff, old-fashioned clothing and solemn expressions. Something is written in copperplate handwriting on the back of each photograph, but the ink is so faded it cannot be read.

6\. A slim black box that holds a medal the likes of which you have never seen before and a photograph, a faded Polaroid of five teenagers in outlandish, brightly-coloured costumes. The girl’s face is mostly obscured by her long red hair. But for the age of the photograph, she could almost be you.

7\. A toothbrush, hardly used.

…

“Scott?”

He slides out from under the car, wiping a blob of black oil from his visor with one arm and only succeeding in smearing it. “What is it?”

“What was I like?”

You can’t see his eyes, you never will (despite the echo of memory that says you have, once,  _just once_ ), but some version of you had learned to read his face despite it, and some part of you still knows the way his face goes blank.

“What do you mean?” he asks, turning his attention back to the undercarriage of the car. It’s a good effort, but his casual tone is a little too forced.

“Before.” You shift, cross and uncross your legs, brush a lock of red hair away from your face where it’s blown into your mouth. “I know the professor said the memories would come in their own time, but I’m getting sick of waiting. And I can’t find anything of mine that gives me any kind of clue about what I was like. You and I were close, you should know something.”

His mouth twists, into something that’s half a smile and half a grimace. “ 'Close’,” he laughs.

You wait for him to say something more, but he just slides back under the car. You wait, but he doesn’t emerge again.

…

Some things are constant.

\- There is a school.

\- It is home.

\- Not just to you. To children. (The exact number is fuzzy.) Outcasts, oddballs, those who need a place where they can gather together with others, not exactly like them, but who understand.

\- There are others.

\- Some who love you. Some who you love. (You still aren’t certain why.)

\- You can move things without touching them. Sometimes, you can hear things without people saying them.

\- You do not know your own strength.

\- You must be contained, for the greater good.

\- Your hair is red; and

\- You are going to die.

…

He finds you in the kitchen, after midnight, staring into the glare from the open fridge.

“What do I like?” you ask, as he brushes past your elbow, and for a moment you are certain you know the feeling of his hands on your bare skin.

He stops, shoulders you gently out of the way as he reaches into the fridge for a glass bottle. “What do  _you_  like?”

“Yeah.”

“Why don’t you tell me?”

You glance over at him, resolutely not meeting your eyes, take in his jaw furred with stubble on the edge of becoming a beard, his compact but powerful frame, the tension in his rough hands and how gently he handles the bottle despite it.

“I don’t remember,” you say.

He looks up at you for the first time, holds your gaze for a handful of seconds before turning back to the fridge.

“Well, I dunno what  _you_  like. But the root beer ain’t half bad.”

He turns and presses another bottle into your hands, a shock of cold in sharp contrast to the heat that radiates from him, standing almost close enough to touch.

At last, he turns his eyes away from your face, whatever he was looking for left unfound.

At the door, he stops again, half-turning to say over his shoulder, “The professor thinks you’re dangerous. Me, I’m starting to agree.”

He leaves, and without moving, you push the fridge door closed.

…

Here are the things you know, about yourself, from the things you left for yourself to find:

1\. You may be a teacher. You have a nervous habit of chewing on things.

2\. You don’t like to stand out. You would prefer to blend in. Mostly.

3\. You do not have a family.

4\. You have neither taken a road trip nor had a pumped-up workout in a long time.

5\. You had a family, once.

6\. You may have had friends, once.

7\. You do not like to brush your teeth.

…

The park is nice, this time of night. Lonely. You aren’t afraid of muggers, of villains, of monsters. You know that the scariest thing in this haunted dark is you.

There’s an old man sitting on the bench by the pond where the ducks live, staring into the water. He doesn’t look up when you approach, but he does say, “Fine night for a walk.”

“It is, isn’t it?”

“What’s a nice young lady like yourself doing out at this hour?”

You don’t laugh, but you do smile. “Probably the same thing a frail old man like yourself is doing. May I sit down?”

He does laugh, and it’s a nice laugh, gentle and kind. He shuffles over, making room for you on the bench, and you sink down, holding your coat tight around you.

The city noise is muffled, distant, through the trees. It’s almost pleasant.

“My nephew’s gone to some wrestling competition,” the old man says, conversationally. “Don’t know why, he’s never had any interest in that sort of thing before. But I’m glad to see him getting back out there. He just wasn’t the same after we lost his parents.” His eyes are blue as chips of summer sky. They crinkle at the corners when he smiles, and, irrationally, you find yourself thinking that this man is someone you can trust.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” you say, and the old man laughs again.

“Don’t be sorry for me! Be sorry for the boy. He’s the one death is hardest on.” His laughter dies away, the smile that takes its place strangely philosophical, even rueful. “Of course, perhaps he needs it. Young people have to grow up sometime, learn to take responsibility. Still, it seems a harsh kind of lesson. And hardly fair to the one who has to teach it.”

“I think I died,” you say, and can’t imagine why.

The old man turns that rueful smile on you. “Of course you did,” he says, and you cannot tell, from the twinkle in his eye or the matter-of-fact tone in his voice, whether he is joking. “I could tell as soon as you sat down.”

You want to ask him if this makes you a ghost, a poltergeist perhaps, but he laughs and says, “But don’t worry, you’ll get plenty more tries to get it right. Good gracious, is that the time? I have to go, my nephew needs me.”

“Wait,” you say, as he pushes himself up from the bench, hearing sirens rising in the distance, but he only smiles at you enigmatically and starts to walk away. “What’s your name?” you call after him, but he only tips his hat and vanishes through the trees, towards the street.

…

Some things are constant.

You wonder if the burning is one of them.

…

They’re all gathered in the study one afternoon when you return from town, the sounds of raised voices abruptly cut off as you approach the door. It swings open without your having to touch it, revealing them all beyond, those kind, hopeful faces caught in attitudes of guilt. Only the professor meets your eyes, that cool, steady gaze as though he’s looking right through you. Which he most likely is. 

Scott speaks first, sounding surprised. “You cut your hair.”

You resist the urge to touch the prickly fuzz at the nape of your neck. “I was sick of wearing it long. Am I interrupting something?”

“No, I think we were finished,” the professor says. His voice is as steady as his gaze, calm and filled with perfect, unquestionable authority. 

You respect him so much. You owe him more than you could ever repay.

You’ve never wanted someone dead so badly.

…

Here are the things you have come to know about yourself:

1\. Long hair gets in your way.

2\. You do not appreciate being talked about behind closed doors as though you are a problem.

3\. You like music, anything with a strong beat that you could dance to.

4\. You like making lists, ordering your thoughts around a series of small facts.

5\. You really like telepathy.

6\. You could do so much more with your - gift, power, ability,  _mutation_  - than you have been allowed to do until now.

7\. You could do so much more with your life than you have allowed yourself to do until now. 

8\. You like root beer fine, but you really prefer Dr. Pepper.

…

“I want you to leave me alone.”

“Jean, it’s for your own good. The professor -”

“I don’t think you heard me. This is my life -”

“Is it really?”

You don’t mean to shatter the windows until you do it. You don’t mean to cause the fireball until it blooms gently around you, setting flame to the small room and the drab wardrobe and the hidden photos and the useless, meaningless junk you left behind.You don’t mean - no, perhaps you do mean to scoop Scott off the ground with the force of your will and nothing more, lock his head in place so he is forced to meet your eyes.

“Yes,” you say. “This is my life.”

…

In the end, it is simple.

They all know you, those kind and hopeful faces. They know the you who left those clothes in your closet and who put those pictures away in a private place and who chewed her way through pens instead of reality and who wanted but never took. They don’t know the you who screams and breaks and wants and takes and devours and burns and  _burns_. This isn’t who they think they love. They want the girl, not the conflagration. 

There’s only one way this could ever end. 

…

When you wake, it is in ashes.


End file.
